Voltaire and the Artsby William B. Lindley
This article is distilled from chapter 33, "The arts: unity and paradox," of Theodore Besterman's biography of Voltaire. Compared to what Voltaire wrote and did in the fields of religion and politics, his commentary on the arts is sparse. He was a firm advocate of good and gracious living, however, and the arts, in his view, were a necessary and organic part of that. He was free in expressing his opinions on the artists of his day, as you would expect. Voltaire's principal book on the arts is Temple du goût (Temple of taste), written in 1732 and published the next year. Besterman calls it "a work unique in its kind: a verse and prose essay in literary and art criticism." In this work, we visit the Temple, and, one by one, the major and minor writers of the time seek admission. A few are let in; many are turned away; all have their work critically appraised by Voltaire in the guise of the Temple's judge. At that time, the rococo style was still on the rise; Besterman admits that this early work of Voltaire's is more or less in that style. However, Voltaire was already on the track of what is now called the neoclassical. Describing his Temple of taste, he wrote: "Its noble architecture was simple; each ornament, in its appointed place, seemed to be there because it was needed: its art was concealed by seeming natural; the eye, satisfied, embraced its structure, never surprised, and always enchanted." Voltaire returned to the subject of the fine arts in Siècle de Louis XIV (1752), and emphasized the classical virtues of reason and simplicity in his commentary on numerous 17th-century artists whose names we need not go into. Alluding to the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur, Voltaire wrote: "The rule that is austere and sure is the thread of Theseus which guides the mind in the labyrinth of the arts." One logical consequence of simplicity, of doing away with irrelevant ornaments, is to depict the human figure in the nude. This esthetic standard came home to Voltaire when, in 1770, the sculptor Pigalle, on commission from Voltaire's admirers, offered to make a statue of him in the nude. Voltaire accepted, and, despite much expected objection, it was done. Voltaire believed strongly that the arts go together and with the social or cultural style or condition of the time. They are of a piece. As he put it: "We know that all the arts are brothers, that each of them illuminates another, and that a universal light results." He also drew a strong connection between the arts and pleasure. An anti-Puritan, he often castigated self-hatred. It would follow that the love of pleasure is a virtue, not a vice. Is art improving over time, or is it degenerating? Voltaire was quite sure that the modern works were superior to the ancient ones; yet he also said that "genius declines," and further: "The first who trace a path always remain at the head in the eyes of posterity." Besterman takes issue with him (a rare event). He retorts: "The genius of man is not a fixed quantity like his blood; it proliferates." That is, new greatness will appear again and again. But then Besterman wistfully comments that the Westminster cathedral is a poor second to the temple of Karnak; that the first printed books were of the best quality; that "Gothic stained glass has never been equaled." How is this resolved? Voltaire believed that applied reason can break the natural tendency of a culture to decay. William B. Lindley is Associate Editor of the Truth Seeker.
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